Another Old Movie Blog

Thursday, August 17, 2017

The Best Years of Our
Lives (1946) is rich with profound and moving scenes.The current events of the past week bring to
mind the scene with Ray Teal in the drugstore.He is, as we learn by his conversation, a far-right fanatic, one of
those who believed President Roosevelt started the war, and that the Nazis were
the good guys.

Harold Russell stops
in the drugstore to visit Dana Andrews, who works behind the counter as a soda
jerk.Ray Teal notices Harold Russell’s
prosthetic hooks:

He says, “Terrible to see a guy like you that had to
sacrifice himself, and for what?”

Harold Russell responds, “’And for what?’ I don’t get you, Mister.”

“We let ourselves get sold down the river.We were pushed into the war.”

“Sure, by the Japs and the Nazis.”

“No, the Germans had nothing against us.They just wanted to fight the Limeys and the
Reds.And they would have whipped them,
too, if we didn’t get deceived into it by a bunch of radicals in Washington.”

“What are you talking about?”

Ray Teal taps his newspaper, likely a publication that fans
his views and his inbred ignorance, and strokes his arrogance. “We
fought the wrong people, that’s
all.Just read the facts, my
friend.Find out for yourself why you
had to lose your hands.And then go out
and do something about it.”

Homer replies, angrily, “Some Americanism.So we’re all a bunch of suckers, hey?So we should have been on the side of the
Japs and the Nazis, hey?”

Teal taps his folded newspaper, “Again, I say, just look at
the facts.”

Homer blows up, they argue.Homer wants to punch him, but can’t because of his prosthetic
hooks.So Dana Andrews sails over the
lunch counter to break up the fight, and punches the American Nazi in the face.It is a satisfying thing to watch.It will not change Teal’s views,
however.We probably know that even
though we never see him again in the movie.We can imagine he will avoid Andrews on sight from now on, and feel
himself to be a victim, not just of Dana Andrews, but of a society where his dumbass
and putrid views are polar opposite to what the Constitution prescribes.Neither do we see any resulting lawsuits against Andrews for the assault, but then the movies like to end arguments with punches, and end bad guys with instant death; the courtroom that should be the final arbiter usually isn't dramatic enough for Hollywood.It is a brave and prescient scene for the
day, acknowledging that not all Americans were united about the war, and that
being anti-Nazi was going to have to be a stance we would need to continue to
take if we wanted to keep ourselves free.

The bitter scene is followed by a tender, touching scene, as
Homer notices the flag pin that fell off Teal’s lapel and landed in the
floor.Homer picks up the flag pin with
remarkable dexterity with his hook, and puts it in his jacket breast pocket,
near his heart.

Dana Andrews may have landed the punch, but Homer saved
democracy by scooping it up off the dirty floor and protecting it.

Thursday, August 10, 2017

A week
after the attack on Pearl Harbor, a program celebrating the 150th
anniversary of the Bill of Rights was produced on all four radio networks of
the day – CBS, NBC Red and Blue networks, and the Mutual network.It was narrated by James Stewart, and a host
of Hollywood players joined him in bringing to life not only the struggles of
post-Revolutionary War America to come up with this Bill of Rights, but how
important it was to reflect on it, and rely on it, in a time of modern
troubles.The program was performed
live.

It is a
remarkable and deeply emotional dramatization that not only speaks to us today,
but sings, shouts, cries, and cheers.Norman
Corwin wrote the beautiful script, performed on December 15, 1941, and it is
estimated over half the U.S. population listened to it.Performed in a Hollywood studio, live hookups
also included performances in New York City, and an address by President
Franklin D. Roosevelt from Washington, D.C. Bernard Herrmann composed original music for
the program, and at the very end of the show, Maestro Leopold Stokowski
conducted “The Star Spangled Banner.”

James
Stewart was, at that time, a corporal in the Army Air Corps, loaned to the
project for the occasion.His fellow
players included Edward Arnold, Lionel Barrymore, Walter Brennan Marjorie Main,
Bob Burns, Walter Huston, Edward G. Robinson, Rudy Vallee, and Orson Welles.

Walter
Huston, rolling his r’s, introduces the program.Then, the familiar voice of Lionel Barrymore is brought to the mic.

“My
name is Barrymore. I’m one of several actors gathered in the studio in
California….”He joins 130 million fellow
Americans in praise of a document “that men have fought for, that men are
fighting for…”

He
announces the cast, and adds, “Our names are meaningless unless your names are
added.”

Then
one by one, the cast fills in, leaving their Hollywood personas and adopting
the guise, in our imaginations, of post-Revolutionary Americans.Jimmy Stewart like his character in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939),which we covered in this post, leads us on a tour of modern Washington, D.C.,
and as he describes monuments and their inscriptions, we are reminded of the movie,
for he is intentionally channeling Mr. Smith’s awe and wonder.

Not
only the message, but the script beams with elegant writing, no longer in
fashion.Perhaps it is too idealistic,
and we have learned to distrust everything.

On
the National Archives building it is written,“ What is past, is prologue.”We
hear the clicking of footsteps as Stewart climbs the stone steps to see the
Bill of Rights in glass – the old parchment with faded writing.Then Stewart and the other actors proceed to
bring it alive.“The words are dim, but
not the meaning of the words…”Perhaps
not.Perhaps we need this lesson.

Stewart
brings us to the hall as the great men rise to speak and call
the roll, to sign their names the draft when Constitution is written, which is then brought back to
the states for review, but the people are suspicious.They want guarantees of certain
protections.And so, this is the story
of how the Bill of Rights came to be added as the most important addendum in
history.

Other
actors jump in to be those common people in the different states who express
their curiosity for the new document, but who want more guarantees, more
explanations of just what they have won in the Revolutionary War.

Walter
Huston is a blacksmith.He doesn’t want
anyone telling him he has to pray the way somebody else tells him.Doesn’t like state religion.Wants to make sure there won’t be any.

Others
are suspicious of authority.They know that just wanting law and order isn’t enough—Nero had such.

Marjorie
Main plays a woman whose husband died in the war.She wants guarantees that he didn’t diein vain.

Edward
Arnold is a bricklayer who argues that the work is unfinished.There’s only a foundation and no house.

So
many voices, so much dissent, so much yearning for rights.We are
taken on a journey not only through history, but through the minds and souls of
this nation.

Thomas
Jefferson, Patrick Henry, James Madison lend their voices, and George Mason
warning us not only about a monarchy, but a “tyrannical aristocracy” taking
over, the monied class.

Now
the First Congress begins sifting through the amendments to the Constitution
and hammering them out for the future.It’s not an easy job, but it’s important and they persist.Stewart passionately narrates, cajoles,
shouts.

Most
profound is Orson Welles’ impassioned speech.He takes over at this point and adds the other voices to the founders of
the Bill of Rights – not just the men in Congress, but from the victims of the
ages – “They had much help, the many nameless and unknown – from bleeding
mouths, burnt flesh – from numberless and nameless agonies.The delegates from dungeons, they were
there.The delegates from ashes at the bottoms
of the stakes were there.”

His
voice grows booming, horrified:“The
Christians killed for being Christians, Jews for being Jews, the Quakers hanged
in Boston town, they made a quorum also… The murdered men, the lopped off
hands, the shattered limbs, the red welts where the whip lash bit into the
back.Must you know what they said?Must you know how they argued?Must you be told the evidence?

“Listen,
then!”

We
hear a blood-curdling scream.

“That
was an argument for an amendment.”

They
are words for our times, how shockingly, sickeningly current.

“How
much of all this must be told to be believed?How much of this must be diagramed: X marks the spot where decency was
last observed?”

Nero
was there, Caligula, Cotton Mather, all the tyrants were observing in the
hall.“All the long and bloody history
of fanaticism, murder in the name of God.”

Christ
was there too.“He, too, sat in the Congress,
the mild Man, with scars in His hands and feet where the spikes went through.He was a consultant in the business at
hand.Had He not died because the rulers
of the realm denied free speech?Was He
not nailed up on a cross between two thieves because His preachments were
considered treason?”

Orson
growls, wails his words.“Out of the agonies,
out of crisscrossed scars of all the human race they made a Bill of Rights for
their own people…To stand against the enemies within, connivers, fakers, those
who lust for power, those who make of their authority an insolence.”

Listen
to Orson’s impassioned speech, and think of now.

The
Bill of Rights “Threw up a bulwark…and made a sign for their posterity against
the bigots, the fanatics, bullies, lynchers, race haters, the cruel men, the
spiteful men, the sneaking men, the pessimists…”

The
Bill of Rights is ratified!Jimmy
Stewart breathes easier and brings the document to the thirteen states.

Then
Edward Arnold, Walter Huston, Marjorie Main, Walter Brennan and others join in
as the amendments are read, each one, and voices answer to illustrate what each
one means.We go to the homes of
farmers, the blacksmith shop, all the new citizens.The war gave them separation from Great
Britain, but the Constitution and the Bill of Rights makes them citizens.

We
hear a woman tending the grave of her soldier husband.We hear a Colonial folk tune.Through all, James Stewart’s folksy ruminating
weaves a thread to guide us to the present.Edward G. Robinson is a political protester who praises the rights that
allow him to speak and fight corruption in city hall.

It
is a fair question, but in only a short time Japanese Americans would have
their rights taken away by virtue of their ethnicity.It was not the Bill of Rights that failed
them; it was their fellow citizens and a president and government who
shamefully allowed their mistreatment.Even in those days when war was declared and Americans were coming
together for mutual support, even in times of great pride, patriotism and
cheerleading, something monstrously unfair could occur.How much easier it is to occur in times when
we are not one, when we are fighting amongst ourselves?When a foreign enemy knows how to divide and conquer.
Abraham Lincoln said:

“From whence shall we expect the approach of danger? Shall some
trans-Atlantic military giant step the earth and crush us at a blow? Never. All
the armies of Europe and Asia...could not by force take a drink from the Ohio
River or make a track on the Blue Ridge in the trial of a thousand years. No,
if destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a
nation of free men we will live forever or die by suicide.”

We've come to that suicidal brink, however, with the aid of Vladimir Putin’s mafia, and the fascism that is rotting our government.We have far superior technology in our media
than they did when this radio program was broadcast in December 1941, but we
have lost the gift of eloquence that they possessed then.Such well-written and carefully crafted words
would today seem to be talking above the heads of the crowds whom the spokesmen
try to reach.Maybe because they are above
the intelligence of the spokesmen.

This
was a live program, so neatly coordinated, so passionately and intimately put
together.Listen to this program and
marvel not only at how it was written, acted, and produced according to the technology
of the day when we were only a week at war, but marvel – for God’s sake, marvel at the message of warning, of
love, and of integrity, of pride for our Bill of Rights.

At
the end of the program, James Stewart introduces in a soft, gentle voice President Roosevelt, who then
speaks live from Washington, D.C.“Ladies
and gentlemen, the President of the people of the United States.”

Of
the people.

It
was reported by Screen Guide magazine
in the March 1942 issue, from which some of these photos are taken, that after
James Stewart introduced the President, he ripped off his earphones at the mic,
and burst into tears.

Thursday, August 3, 2017

Animator and director Chuck Jones said of June Foray, "June Foray is not the female Mel Blanc; Mel Blanc was the male June Foray." For a cartoon voice artist, there can be no greater tribute. There were other tributes as well during her long career, many awards, among them she holds the honor of being the oldest person--at age 94--to be nominated for, and win, an Emmy. June Foray died last week just shy of her 100th birthday.I take particular pride in noting that she came from my neck of the woods, western Massachusetts. She was born and raised in Springfield, graduated from Classical High School in that city, and her first work as a voice artist came on the local Springfield radio station WBZA.

Fortunately for us, her work was recorded on video, audio, children's records, a wide array of media--and the sound media that gave her a career will continue to give us enjoyment of her talent. She lived a century, and her work reflects the media explosion of that remarkable century. Here is a clip on YouTube of only some of her voice characters. Have a listen, and look at her cartoon characters. You can't help but smile.

The
Mansfield Drive-In has three screens, with double features playing on
each.Our double feature was War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)
and Wonder Woman (2017).We didn’t finish the second movie as it was
getting into the wee hours and we had an hour drive home.By that time, I confess, I was a little weary
of violence and simplistic characters that would entertain a child or someone
with the mind of one.Not that I don’t
applaud Wonder Woman’s getting her due on the big screen—hurray for the girls—but
she’s still no match for Tracy Lord, Stella Dallas, Ilsa Lund, or Mildred
Pierce, if you get my drift.Margo
Channing would have chewed her up and spit her out.Heck, so would Birdie.

As
for the Apes, I noticed that though the makeup and CGI combined had made the
ape creatures incredibly realistic compared to the original series, the script
was much more inferior when it came to dialogue or any kind of message, or
indeed, any kind of point at all.There
was actually very little dialogue.The
new movie follows the ape leader Caesar on an act of revenge with no purpose.It is left to others with more sense to save the ape
colony.The original Planet of the Apes (1968) I had blogged
about last summer when it came to the big screen at the local cinema as part of
the Fathom Events partnership with Turner Classic Movies was not as
sophisticated technologically, to be sure, but it had a far more literate and
intelligent script.This is from my
blog post on that experience last year:

The other thing
that surprised me was how the themes in this much-parodied pop culture
movie-turned-“franchise” have remained relevant: the ape council’s rejection of
science because it threatens the power of a fundamentalist government, the
refusal to acknowledge truths that are not politically convenient, the cycle of
prejudice and subjugation. Rod Serling wrote the script based on Pierre
Boulle’s novel, and Serling's introspective and intellectual imprint is all
over this movie. There is a late 1960s feeling of the exhilaration of
rebellion, without all the tired dystopian bilge we are beaten over the head
with today.

When Charlton
Heston comes upon the half-buried Statue of Liberty and screams his last lines,
I’m sure all in the theater were quite familiar with the end of the movie, but
there was still an awed silence, then the audience erupted in applause.

I
am still tired of dystopian bilge.I
find its parallel with the current fascist regime in the White House and Congress to be
appalling, and yet is somehow something we have allowed to happen by our lack of meaningful
entertainment, our shallowness, and lack of a true spirit of adventure, despite
our ape leader trudging through the snow to kill his enemies, and despite
Wonder Woman leaving her island paradise to save mankind. As a society, we have gotten lazy and
stupid. Instead of taking charge and defining our era, we have sat back and allowed it to define us.Hey, TCM, hey Fathom Events...what I'd love to see is some classic films on the drive-in screen. Can you do that?

What
I found totally unexpected and quite charming in this drive-in movie experience was the pre-movie 1950s and 1960s
music on the FM frequency we were to hear the sound from – no more speakers on
your car door (we brought our own radio so as not to drain the car battery) –and
also the classic TV commercials that reminded us Boomers of the heyday when
drive-ins could be found pretty much anywhere.There are no more drive-in theaters in my area – the closest are the one
in Mansfield, Connecticut, and another in New Hampshire—but back in the day
there was one in my town and several more within probably five miles.They are all shopping plazas now.

Next
on the screen, another totally unexpected delight, was the classic “Let’s all
go the lobby…” promo cartoon and the audience in their cars and lawn chairs erupted in cheers and applause.It was
not for the quality of the grainy 70-year-old cartoon urging us to go to the
refreshment stand “and have ourselves a treat” that they applauded. It was for the memory of simpler joys and
being too young then to really appreciate them.

I
did see a little girl in her jammies, and that was cute.I remembered those days, and having to be
carried into the house by my father when we got home because I had fallen
asleep in the back seat.

But
I also saw a grown woman in pajama bottoms.Well, I’ve seen people wearing them at the post office, too, so I don’t
know if she expected to fall asleep or that was just what was in her closet.

Between
the two features, we got another ten-minute burst of a “Let’s all go to the
lobby….” adventure with the well-dressed, white, middle class American family
who ate refreshment stand goodies like goats eating the lawn, and large hot
dogs and cups of soda coming to life and dancing for us.It would have been surreal, except that it
was so comfortingly familiar and innocent.It was the kind of stupidity that didn’t make one angry; it made one
smile.

Interesting
that nobody clapped for the science fiction characters who had adventures in
our place—not representing us but substituting for us; the audience applauded
the dancing popcorn cartons and the voracious cartoon family that could not get
enough treats.

Perhaps
more than the apes and humans seeking revenge on each other, I enjoyed the
black sky full of brilliant stars.The
Big Dipper hung just over the top of the screen.The summer night air was heavy with scents
from the woods nearby and freshly cut fields, and maybe bug spray.

We
left before we got too tired because if we had fallen asleep, nobody was going
to carry us into the house.

Thursday, July 6, 2017

Independence Day wouldn't be the same without Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942). Fortunately, Turner Classic Movies seems to agree. James Cagney might well be inextricably linked to George M. Cohan, to the extent that Cohan's career in theatre far outstrips his handful of film appearances. Cohan did, however, make a few movies.His first, Broadway Jones (1917) transferred his stage persona to screen, though a silent film is obviously not the best showcase for a musical star. It was based on his stage show and filmed by his own company, Cohan Feature Films Company.

His play Seven Keys to Baldpate (1917) was his next try at films. Hedda Hopper was his co-star. This and his next film were produced by Famous Players. That was Hit-the-Trail Holliday (1918), a comedy about a temperance crusade -- before Prohibition.

The Phantom President (1932) is interesting for its election year subject, and especially that his co-star was Claudette Colbert and Jimmy Durante. This was produced by Paramount. Have a look at a clip here.

Gambling (1934) was George M.'s last movie, for Fox this time. Films were not his forte -- like some stage actors, he preferred the live audience reaction -- but his prodigious theatre career is remembered mainly by Cagney's movie about him.

Thursday, June 29, 2017

Someone discovered the two small posters, mounted but unframed, at a flea market. My Little Chickadee (1940), starred Mae West and W.C. Fields, as pictured, in the comedy western. These two stars were old vaudevillians. Their skits were polished from decades of performing their well-known characters live in theaters across the country. The movie is less an amusing look at the nineteenth century American West as it is a revival of early twentieth century popular entertainment...and a spoof by both stars about their own stage personas.

The poster is modern souvenir kitsch, such as you may find on the walls of any home of a classic film fan. The art department of Universal Studios would marvel at this.

Stanley and Livingstone (1939), from 20th Century Fox, was made the year before My Little Chickadee, and likewise looked back on a more innocent if more adventurous era as the reporter played by Spencer Tracy attempts to track down the missionary in the wilds of Africa.

We were on the brink of entering World War II when these movies with old-fashioned themes became hits of the modern era. The posters are in public domain, copied and copied, and put on mugs, magnets, and any other handy item that will hold a brightly colored illustration. The merchandizing is not publicizing the movie anymore, however; it's publicizing the art department of the studio. Unsung and forgotten, but whose work is still appreciated, and apparently, still just as marketable as the movie.

-----

My thanks to Gail Watson for these posters and her knowledge of collectibles.

Thursday, June 22, 2017

I'd like to shine the spotlight today on two fellow classic film bloggers and their splendid achievements: Raquel Stecher, and John Greco.

Raquel pens the Out of the Past blog, which is celebrating a ten-year anniversary. Have a look at her anniversary post here. I've been a regular reader of her blog for many years, and probably among my favorite posts are about her annual participation in the TCM Classic Film Fest. Her exploration of classic movies has brought her on a wonderful journey, which she shares with us with eloquence and enthusiasm.

John Greco, who writes the Twenty Four Frames blog likewise shares his passion and knowledge on classic film in very entertaining and informative posts, but John also has other talents: he is a professional photographer (you can peruse and purchase some of his work here at Fine Art America), and also a writer.

John's latest eBook is a collection of short stories called Devious Tales. With a decidedly noir streak and some very surprising endings, this book of dark tales will intrigue and fascinate fans of mysteries.

Classic film bloggers seem to enjoy a wide range of interests and excel at many talents, and my admiration for Raquel and John is not only for their blogs, but that their blogs have led to other adventures. Well done!

Thursday, June 15, 2017

The
March of Time short subject Teen-Age Girls
(1945) is a window on a societal ripple in postwar America that is, unusually,
both dated and prescient.The documentary examines the emergence of
teens as a new and important demographic, particularly females in this case,
with a lighthearted and even amused attitude, but with a curious reservation—perhaps
not unlike the way a parent first notices that a child isn’t a child anymore.

This
is our final post in this series about how Hollywood depicted children during World
War II.The March of Time apparently
felt, and perhaps not wrongly, that the dawn of the Teen-Age was as likely to
be as influential a force in American society as the nuclear age.The narrator begins:

Of all the
phenomena in wartime life in the United States, one of the most fascinating and
mysterious…has been the emergence of the teenage girl in her own right.

This
was not something Hollywood evidently considered earlier in the war, when the
worldwide emergency seemed to put children’s needs secondary and yet led to a future where teens would dominate the culture and even the economy.

In
almost a spoof of an anthropological study, a group of sociologists and
psychiatrists sits around a conference table while a teenage girl narrates her
world for them in an authoritative interview.We are shown scenes of empowered bobbysoxers in sweater sets and pearls,
rolled up jeans and oversized white Oxford shirts, loafers and lipstick, and
she tells them about her tribe.The
narrator concurs:

Where once
teenagers were without group identity, lingering diffidently in the uncertain
period between childhood and womanhood, today they constitute one of the most
highly individualized and acutely noticeable groups in the nation.

If a girl doesn’t
dress right, the way everyone else is dressing, she’s just out…You want them to
think I’m different or something?

They
want their own rooms, their pinups, their pin money. There is also a rather proud and defiant
desire to not be, or even appear to be, intellectual.

We don’t have
time to read newspapers much.

When
the teen authority announces that her tribe thinks about serious and important things,
and even discusses them in a radio talk show with other teens, we are seen a
circle of them around a microphone discussing whether they should go steady
with just one boy, or more.

They
gather at slumber parties and like it when boys catcall at the windows.Despite this,

We’re not in a
hurry to grow up—get all serious and morbid like older people.

The
documentary notes that the music and fashion industries were already starting
to pay attention to this new demographic, though it would be another decade
before the cultural and economic scales would tip irrevocably to young adults.Perhaps their elders were rendered meek, fatigued and
demoralized by what they had endured during the war years to the point of not being able to keep their teen girls from hogging the phone.What the enemy didn’t get out of them, their
own American teens finished them off.

However,
the complaining and impertinent squeak from the girls would be child’s play
indeed compared to the revolt by the next generation in the late 1960s and
early 1970s, which would in turn be considered mild compared to today’s cell
phone zombies whose interaction when pulled away from their texting is
frequently one of rude disdain minus the revolution.Did their evolution begin with the bobbysoxers
in their sweater sets and “keep out” signs on their bedrooms?

The
kids with latchkeys on strings around their necks, coming home to an empty
house because the folks were at the war plant and big brother was in the
Marines became, in their twenties in the 1950s, the Silent Generation.If they were conformists and uninvolved
politically, nevertheless their buying power would change American
society, though after their first declaration of independence in 1945, they appeared to lose steam.Feminism would come to their
daughters before it came to them.Would
Hollywood ever really pay attention to them?In the late 1950s and early 1960s they would be parodied as company men
and housewives, (indeed, unlike their Rosie the Riveter mothers, this generation might have been the first where most of them did not work outside the home, or become involved in a home business) consumers of washers, dryers, and tranquilizers.The flower power generation’s revolt was
geared at World War II era parents, so the Silent Generation even missed the
prominence of being defied.

How
ironic, to form the vanguard of this new dynamic force in society—the teenager—to
be “acutely noticeable” as teens in 1945 and yet to fly under radar for decades
to come. March of Time’s Teen-Age Girls was released this day,
June 15, 1945.The war in Europe had
ended, but there was still fighting in the Pacific.A pause at the beginning of the last summer
of the war brought a reflection on what the postwar world would be—and a brief
thought to the teens among us who had collected scrap for the war effort, and
wrote to servicemen, and wanted, somehow, to matter.

This
is the end of our series on Hollywood’s depiction of children during World War
II.Previous posts in this series are:

Thursday, June 8, 2017

The Search (1948)
is tenderly filmed.The plot of the
story carries the weight of the world and the eternal suffering of children
during war, but lifts our hearts, though they may be breaking, as if on wings of
angels.Those angels are UNRRA (United
Nations Relief and Rehabilitation) workers, and a young GI, and even us, if we
have taken this movie to heart and take something away from it.

This is the fourth post in our series on how Hollywood
depicted children during World War II.This time, we leave the well-fed American kids behind, and step back to
Europe in the aftermath of war.It is
said that the first casualty of war is truth.The final byproduct is refugees.

We encounter a small
boy, one of the millions of refugees after World War II who have been released
from concentration camps.He is brought
with nameless others to an UNRRA central tracing bureau to be processed and, if
possible, reunited with relatives searching for them.The movie takes on documentary-like qualities
as we follow the children upon their arrival, sleeping in a boxcar on top of
each other, ragged, sallow, starving, and sick—and terrified of the UNRRA
personnel in uniform.It is how they
began their journey to the concentration camps; it is how the war ends for
them.

Aline MacMahon, one of Hollywood’s finest and most valuable
players, is in charge and interviews the kids in many languages.Ivan Jandl plays Karel, a boy who was
separated from his mother at Auschwitz.His father and sister are dead.He does not speak, only automatically repeats, “Ich weiss nicht,” (I
don’t know) to answers put to him.He is
like a zombie, wooden, haunted, and barely able to function.He also suffers from amnesia from the trauma
of the concentration camp.His number is
tattooed on his arm.

In a moment of panic, he and another boy escape and wander
the ruins of this German city.Attempting to cross a river, the other boy drowns.Though director Fred Zinnemann crafts a
gentle telling of the story, it is nevertheless unblinking in its frank
observations of the tragedies we witness.Karel loses only his knitted cap in the water, and when that is
recovered by UNRAA staff, they believe him to have drowned as well.

Alone now, Karel wanders aimlessly, until he meets
Montgomery Clift, an Army engineer, part of the army of occupation.Clift feeds him, takes him back to the
building he shares billeting with Wendell Corey.In days to come, the boy is cleaned, dressed
in new clothes, and Clift teaches him English by naming objects in pictures
torn from magazines.Karel seems
contented, but he still cannot emotionally or by memory connect with his
past.Clift wants to take him back to
America.

That involves tremendous red tape.

Eventually, he will take him to the UNRAA
camp to help facilitate his adoption of Karel, whom he calls Jim.This was Montgomery Clift’s first film, and
he is a marvel of natural and riveting screen presence.Many of his joking remarks and responses to
the boy seem ad libbed and he has a wonderful off-the-cuff and in the moment
delivery.He is a lighthearted young
man, quick with a funny quip, but the deeper he becomes involved with the boy
the more sober he becomes. (And his character may remind us of his role in The Big Lift-1950, which we covered here.) When he tries
to form a plan to get the boy to the U.S., Wendell Corey counters that it is impractical
and the rules impeding this are necessary: “We’d have all of Europe in America
if we didn’t have those rules.”

Clift responds, “So what?”

“You’re the one who used to make cracks about those filthy
DP’s, remember?”

“I did?"

“Yes, you did.Not so
very long ago, either.”

Clift answers, “Well, now I’ve learned something.”

Indeed he has, and we still struggle with that argument
today.

Mr. Clift has a nice, easy rapport with the Ivan Jandl, who
was from Czechoslovakia and only made a handful of films.He is a splendid interpreter of this role:
unaffected, natural, and perhaps wise beyond his years in his intuitive
relationship with the camera.It is also
a wise choice on the part of director Zinnemann to follow the boy with long
scenes of no dialogue.We see deeper
into the child’s world if we are allowed to adopt his mindset and we can do
this more easily if we take on his silent observation of the world around him.

One of the most affecting scenes in the movie is when
Wendell Corey’s wife and young son arrive to share their housing.Clift will be rotated back to the U.S. very
soon, but Corey will be part of the army of occupation for a while yet.Karel observes Corey’s son interacting with
his mother.At one point, the son cries
and the mother comforts him.This
triggers a long dormant memory in Karel.He asks Clift, “What is a mother?”Charmingly inventive, Clift points to one the magazine photos thumb
tacked on the wall of their room that he has used to teach the boy
English.It is a photo of a long-eared funny-looking
bloodhound sitting next to a smaller pup.Presumably, he has used this photo to teach the boy the word “dog.”Now Clift points to the bigger dog and says, “This
is the mother.”Then to the puppy, “This
is the child.”

Karel chews on this a while, and grows distressed. Looking
at the photo, his expression becomes pained, and he struggles with a scene that
remains in his mind of a woman who had been with him in the camp.As he sits and almost like an automaton,
draws lines on a paper, he suddenly remembers the pattern of the chain link
fence in the camp.Earlier in the film,
we are given a flashback scene of when his mother was taken from him, separated
into a different camp.She calls to him,
and kisses him through the small opening in the chain link fence.

It all comes back to Karel now, and he sobs, and he demands
that Clift help him find his mother.“Where
is my mother?I have a mother.I know I have a mother.Where is she?”Clift believes Karel’s mother is dead, and
tries to distract him with talk of going to America.Karel is angry, and sneaks out in the night.

We follow him again across the ruins of war-torn Germany, until
eventually; Clift finds him and takes him to the UNRRA camp where he hopes to
begin the paperwork of adopting Karel.

Earlier in the film, we are shown that Karel’s mother,
played by celebrated opera singer Jarmila Novotna, whom we also saw here
in The Great Caruso (1951), has
survived and is searching for him.In a
nail-biting series of circumstances, they continually miss each other.Aline MacMahon helps to put together clues,
and we are given the gift of finally seeing mother and son reunited.I don’t know if we could take this movie if
that didn’t happen.

The Search is
really a very simple story, simply filmed, about very complicated geopolitical
issues, and that is the wonder of it.It
allows us to see a large picture on a very small scale and connect with it in a
personal way.The movie was filmed, at least
in part, in Europe so the location shooting is stark and genuine.We do not have the optimistic and jingoistic
approach of helping children in wartime as we saw in The Piped Piper.We were
still fighting the war then.We are in
the aftermath now, where at least as far as the mind of a child refugee is
concerned, the world is borderless, without nationalities or allegiances—but it
is not free.It is a nightmarish maze of
confusing obstacles.Every grownup who
displays compassion is a monumental hero.

Come back next Thursday when we finish our series with a
look at another March of Time short subject, a world away and back to America
with the dawn of a new age—not the nuclear age, but the Teen Age.

Bob the Bear - a picture book by my twin brother & Me

Read Arte Acher's Falling Circus

Recent Comments on Past Posts:

It Happened to Jane is special to my family. My mother was selected to play the wife of Aaron Caldwell, the Chester town selectman in the movie and has a speaking part about the parking meter revenues gathered from outside his general store in the town center. My older brother was one of the cub scouts delivering coal donated by town residents to fuel Old 97. We grew up in Deep River. A few years ago a niece provided every member of music family copies of It Happened to Jane on DVD. The Connecticut River valley was truly an idyllic spot for growing up in the mid-Twentieth Century!

Thank you, the Lux Theatre broadcast was absolutely marvelous, and far superior, as you have indicated, the film. I have always admired Dorothy McGuire, and she has it all over Jean Peters. This is not as clear cut a differential between Joseph Cotton and Dan Dailey, but at this point in their grand careers, I will take Dan. Again thank you.

I jus watched this and I have to agree... the ending let me down. She left Howard Keel!!!! I've had a crush on him since seeing Seven Brides when I was 10.I did love the message that Rose Marie can be herself.But I'm still sad. Seriously, Rose Marie, you chose the wrong man.

My wife and I go back two decades for our love of “Remember the Night” and its heartwarming story...P.S. As I type these words I am reminded of the inscription my wife had engraved inside the wedding ring I now wear… “Remember The Night.”

Beautiful piece, Jacqueline, about yet another movie from the Unjustly Forgotten file. I agree a video release is decades overdue, (What is wrong with Universal Home Video? You'd think the only movies they ever made were monsters and Abbott & Costello. And don't even get me started on the pre-'48 Paramounts they're sitting on.) I count myself lucky to have scored a decent 16mm print on eBay some years back; otherwise it would have been a good 40 years since I saw it.

I happened upon this piece and wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed reading it. Really a great appreciation of a wonderful movie. Raoul Walsh is one of my favorite directors and this is the first of his movies I ever remember seeing--it was on the big screen back in 1952 so I guess that dates me but a movie like this was ideal for my age, both for the adventure and romance.

I guess I'm going to be busy reading all your blogs that touch on events I'm familiar with.

Judgement At Nuremberg caught my attention as I had the privilege of working in it for some 60 days. But more so as the German WWII history always recall my own trials during the war.

I suppose we filmed this around 1959-1960 which is not that long after the ending of the war. Reconstruction in Europe was far from accomplished. For the audience in 1961 this history was still a part of everyone's life.

I was overwhelmed sitting in that set and listening to the greatest actors of that generation orate day after day... an endless live theater.